Caulk, adhesive, potting material and other fluid systems are commonly contained in tubular cartridges of the type having an outlet nozzle at one end and an opposite open end that is closed by a wiper slidably seated against the inside face of the cartridge wall. The material is discharged from the outlet nozzle by advancing the wiper through the cartridge toward the nozzle. Available dispensing tools utilize a plunger connected to a red, and a power device that forces the rod and plunger axially into the open cartridge end and against the wiper. Many dispensing tools are hand held and portable, where the power device is a ratchet mechanism indexed incrementally upon manual trigger squeezes.
Single component fluid systems use only one material cartridge, the material being discharged therefrom via an elongated dispensing tube having the outlet nozzle at its downstream end. Multiple component fluid systems use different material cartridges from which the materials are simultaneously discharged in the precise ratio needed to form the intended composite material, the discharged materials being blended together in an elongated mixing/dispensing tube before being discharged as the composite material from the outlet end of the dispensing tube. Common multiple component materials include two-part epoxies, urethanes, silicones, phenolics, acrylics and polyesters.
Component fluid systems have been successfully used for filling surface cracks in concrete structures to restore structural integrity. Special conduit routing structures can be fitted over the outlet end of the dispensing tube for more accurately directing the discharged material to the intended region of use. One such routing structure is a surface port device, which is in the form of a tube having at the outlet end an enlarged flat base that can be bonded by adhesive to the structural surface with the tube bore aligned over a surface crack. The material dispensing tube is then seated against the inlet end of the tube to funnel the discharged material via the surface port device directly into the underlying crack.
Our U.S. Pat. No. 5,263,614 issued on Nov. 23, 1993 discloses manual dispensing tools having spring linkages between the power device and each driven plunger for storing and dissipating unused energy inputted to the power device for maintaining substantially continuous forces on the plunger even between successive trigger squeezes. This overcomes many problems that can occur when discharging an incompressible material with an incrementally actuated power device.
Our U.S. Pat. No. 5,314,092 issued on May 24, 1994 discloses a specific dispensing tool plunger having a shiftable O-ring for providing a sealing-venting action to minimize leakage past the wiper and plunger when dicharging the material, while allowing the plunger to be removed from the emptied cartridge for reuse.
Our U.S. Pat. No. 5,433,354 issued on Jul. 18, 1995 from copending application Ser. No. 08/154,625 filed Nov. 18, 1993 discloses a port device for funneling material into a surface crack, the port device having great universality to operate effectively with many different types and sizes of dispensing tubes and outlet nozzles used in dispensing fluid material(s) from tubular cartridge(s), while maintaining a leakproof seated fit between the dispensing tube outlet nozzle and port device inlet, and possibly even without the need for physically holding these seated components together with any significant force.
Our patented port device had a tube with its inlet end stepped at adjacent axially extended inner land areas of progressively smaller diameters in the direction toward the outlet end, these land areas being sized so that at least one would snuggly receive at least one of the outer land areas provided on the different dispensing nozzles and/or tubes. These components when telescoped together establish the substantially leakproof and mechanically constrained connection for conveying the dispensed material. The flat base at the outlet end of the port device had sidle edges that could be flexed out of the flat, to position the device more closely adjacent an interior structural corner for directing material accurately into the corner.
One problem yet exists with this port device, specifically when attempting to provide material discharge relative to a structural corner, be it into an interior structural corner or onto an exterior structural corner. As such, the dispensing outlet is spaced from the structural corner and the discharged material merely oozes between the structures of the surface and port device, with little or no pressure built-up forcing the material into any underlying crack. Also, this port device cannot be used with high pressure material discharges, as only limited bonding areas exist between the flat base and structural surface, whereby excessive pressures merely blows the port device off of the surface even when bonded thereto. In order to provide such high pressure cracking, a hole would be drilled in the structure communicating with the underlying crack and a different type of dispensing tube would be driven into the hole to establish a stronger mechanical connection between the tube and structure, suited to withstand the forces of the dispensed high pressure materials.
Still another problem with this port device is that even though it satisfies the universality of fitting with most dispensing tubes of different commercially available material cartridges and from different suppliers, this mode of cooperation yet requires the user to hold the dispensing tool close to and connected to the port device. As the fill rate of most cracks commonly is slow to provide deep material penatration into the crack rather than just along the structural surface, the time to complete a crack could involve a relatively long time, making it difficult without tiring to hold the tool properly in place.